Golden Spike National Historic Site is a U.S. National Historic Site located at Promontory Summit, north of the Great Salt Lake in Utah.
It commemorates the completion of the first Transcontinental Railroad where the Central Pacific Railroad and the Union Pacific Railroad met on May 10, 1869. The final joining of the rails spanning the continent was signified by the driving of the ceremonial Golden Spike.
The Golden Spike National Historic Site encompasses 2,735 acres (1,107 ha). In 2002, it received 49,950 visitors. It was authorized as a National Historic Site on April 2, 1957 under non-federal ownership. It was authorized for federal ownership and administration by an act of Congress on July 30, 1965.
In 1978, a general master plan for the site was adopted with the goal of maintaining the site's scenic attributes as closely as possible to its appearance and characteristics in 1869.
In 2006, a petition to the Board on Geographic Names resulted in a name change for Chinamans Arch, a 20-foot (6.1 m) limestone arch at Golden Spike NHS. Named Chinaman's Arch in honor of the 19th century Chinese railroad workers, the arch has now been officially renamed as the Chinese Arch to mollify sensitivities about the original name (which remains a common usage).
Famous quotes containing the words golden, spike, national, historic and/or site:
“O polished perturbation! golden care!
That keep’st the ports of slumber open wide
To many a watchful night.”
—William Shakespeare (1564–1616)
“From a hasty glance through the various tests I figure it out that I would be classified in Group B, indicating “Low Average Ability,” reserved usually for those just learning to speak the English Language and preparing for a career of holding a spike while another man hits it.”
—Robert Benchley (1889–1945)
“The Federated Republic of Europe—the United States of Europe—that is what must be. National autonomy no longer suffices. Economic evolution demands the abolition of national frontiers. If Europe is to remain split into national groups, then Imperialism will recommence its work. Only a Federated Republic of Europe can give peace to the world.”
—Leon Trotsky (1879–1940)
“We are becoming like cats, slyly parasitic, enjoying an indifferent domesticity. Nice and snug in “the social” our historic passions have withdrawn into the glow of an artificial cosiness, and our half-closed eyes now seek little other than the peaceful parade of television pictures.”
—Jean Baudrillard (b. 1929)
“That is a pathetic inquiry among travelers and geographers after the site of ancient Troy. It is not near where they think it is. When a thing is decayed and gone, how indistinct must be the place it occupied!”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)